News Release

Total population data capture paired with Performance Improvement (PI) CME to improve patient outcomes for diabetes care in the primary care practice

BOSTON – March 2, 2011 – Joslin Diabetes Center has launched a groundbreaking initiative for primary care physicians to improve diabetes care. Joslin, with technology from Forward Health Group, Inc., is providing qualifying primary care practices in the United States with the critical capability to extract usefulness out of existing clinical data at the individual patient level, and to combine this information with practice improvement support and education. The initiative is supported via independent continuing medical education (CME) grant funding provided by GlaxoSmithKline and Merck & Co.

“To move the needle toward real improvement in diabetes, we need to know where the gaps are in order to provide targeted education and resources to improve,” said Richard Beaser, M.D., Medical Executive Director for Joslin Professional Education. “This initiative does exactly that.”

Using clinical informatics tools provided by Forward Health Group, Joslin is providing enhanced electronic clinical data capture and outcomes data visualization capabilities to qualifying practitioners. Each practitioner is then directed to a suite of Joslin education, tools and resources targeted to individual gaps to support improvement over time well beyond the scope of the performance improvement (PI) CME activity alone.

"This initiative truly has the potential to be transformational,” said Michael Barbouche, Founder and CEO of Forward Health Group. “The world's leading provider of clinical care, research and education in diabetes can now provide total population data for the busy primary care doctor. Participating physicians can view their entire panel of patients, identify gaps in execution and delivery of care, and rely on Joslin education resources to improve. It’s a great opportunity for practices to improve where they most need it and meet important quality benchmarks and certain CME and potentially Maintenance of Certification (MOC) requirements without having to invest many hours in manually abstracting charts."

In addition to data support, participating practices will have access to proven education and point of care tools and resources and other dedicated Joslin staff support. Joslin is actively recruiting practices. Interested parties should contact Karen Kuc at 617-226-5933 or karen.kuc@joslin.harvard.edu.

About Joslin Professional Education

Joslin Diabetes Center, accredited since 1995, was most recently awarded Accreditation with Commendation by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) in 2006. Joslin’s innovative performance improvement-focused CME program for physicians and other health professionals advances the highest standards of care. The program includes live symposia and courses, Audio CDs, mobile applications, Web-based educational activities, and Performance Improvement CME Pathways. For more information about Joslin Professional Education and Joslin PI CME pathways visit www.jpec.joslin.org.

About Forward Health Group

Forward Health Group is a leading-edge clinical informatics company, transforming fragmented clinical and administrative healthcare data stored in disparate systems, into actionable information that can be used to drive population health improvement. For more information, visit www.forwardhealthgroup.com.